High-profile festival participants and award recipients will return their accolades in protest of Pride’s ban of the phrase “Israeli apartheid.”

The outcry against Pride Toronto’s ban of the phrase “Israeli apartheid” continues to swell as more than 20 high-profile festival participants and award recipients are set to return their accolades in protest.

“(The backlash) is getting bigger and bigger, the ripples are going across the world,” said QuAIA member Elle Flanders.

“We did try to tell (Pride Toronto) that nobody is going to like the ban and that wasn’t only about Israel and apartheid and QuAIA, but that it was a much larger issue about trying to suggest who can and cannot be in a Pride parade. That is not Pride’s job.”

Flanders remained mum on who will be renouncing their accolades, but described them as “community leaders, community builders and community members,” adding that they range in profession from spiritual leaders to politicians.

Among that list is Salah Bachir, a prominent city philanthropist, former grand marshal and founder of the Pride Awards. He has donated more than $1 million toward expanding and refurbishing the 519 Church St. Community Centre — a hub not just for the Pride festival, but for the city’s queer community.

Bachir is in Lebanon was not unavailable for comment.

The protestors also include Jane Farrow, who rescinded her acceptance of the “honoured dyke” role as this year’s festival not as an endorsement of QuAIA, but as a defence of the group’s right to speak at Pride.

“Queers have rightfully insisted that the personal is political, so when more than a few of us get together in one place, political terrain is created,” Farrow wrote in an open letter to Pride’s Sandilands. “As history shows, suppressing people’s right to express and explore political difference leads to some very dark and dangerous places.”

The decision to ban the phrase “Israeli apartheid” came amid pressure from city councillors, Pride sponsors, mayoral contestants and Jewish advocacy groups.

The city, which gave Pride $121,000 in 2009, said its anti-discrimination policy was likely violated by QuAIA’s very presence at last summer’s parade, Toronto’s general manager of economic development and culture said in April before the ban was made.

Flanders, who was born in Israel, criticized opponent’s who call QuAIA’s cause hate speech or anti-Semitic, saying it “just shuts down any conversation” or discourse.

“This is legitimate criticism of a country and state policy,” she said.

She said QuAIA and supporters’ goal right now is to have the ban rescinded. But if that doesn’t happen soon, she said the group may begin calling for the heads of Pride to resign.

“If they don’t heed this, I guess at a certain point we’ve got to say, are these the people we really want running a community parade, a community organization?”

The group has said it will attempt to march in the parade under its name despite the ban, raising the possibility of a street confrontation on July 4.

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